OCTOBER 2024 IS the latest completion date for the new National Children’s Hospital, according to the National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB).
The board is set to appear before the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee (PAC) tomorrow, when it will state that “the stated substantial completion date in this latest programme is 29 October 2024″.
“We are in constant engagement with BAM to ensure that the October 2024 substantial completion is achieved. All our efforts are focused on getting certainty on this date,” the chief officer of the NPHDB, David Gunning, states in his opening statement.
However, the statement concludes by stating that the completion date of the building phase becomes the start date of an “operational commissioning phase”, leaving a question mark over when the hospital will actually be up-and-running.
The Irish Independent reported earlier today that it could take at least six months to make the facility operational, meaning the hospital would not be fully open until April 2025 at the earliest.
Questioned by The Journal about the possible timeline delay, Public Expenditure Minister Paschal Donohoe said it is a “matter I’m looking to clarify myself”.
When asked about the opening timeline, Tánaiste Micheál Martin said today:
“My view is the hospital is very well advanced, we want to complete it as quickly as possible. and in the best manner possible in terms of commissioning of equipment and so on. I had a different timeline yesterday to the early 2025 timeline but it’s a matter of months between the two timelines.”
When put to the minister that the opening might be pushed out, he said: “I think we have to be very conscious that in all the contractual talks that have been going on, the public commentary on timelines creates perhaps wrong pressures.
“This has to be done properly in terms of value for money for the citizen. It has to get done property in terms of the quality of the building, which is superb.
“And we just had to get it done. Because I think in the fullness of time, when it is completely commissioned it will be I think a world class facility.”
Martin said there has been huge challenges between those who were responsible for commissioning the hospital and those who have the contract to deliver the hospital.
To date, the total amount spent by the NPHDB (as of 30 September 2023) is €1,361,703,344, according to the opening statement to the PAC.
The board states this leaves €71 million remaining in the current overall capital
budget of €1.433 billion.
“Work on the hospital is 92% complete (as at the end of September 2023),” said the board.
Committee members will be told tomorrow that there are a number of contract provisions that were not included as part of the capital approval, such as construction inflation in excess of 4%, changes in scope resulting from healthcare policy changes; statutory changes and Covid-19, all of which have added cost to the project.
The building is well advanced but there is still some way to go to substantial completion, the board states, stating that typically, in a building of this size and scale, the last 10% is the slowest to complete.
The committee will be told tomorrow that the contractor BAM continues to submit large volumes of claims.
2,379 claims have been raised up to the end of September 2023. The substantiated value as claimed by BAM is €769 million. Of these, 1,610 claims of €16.75 million and a further €2.1 million has been agreed through the dispute management process.
This additional €18.85 million is circa 2% of the overall contract value, the committee will hear.
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